Visual Insighthttp://www.visualinsight.net
Unleashing the Power of ImaginationMon, 13 Jul 2015 19:03:45 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.2.2New Mural on Women Innovators: Art meets Research to Tackle the Biggest Conundrum of our Timehttp://www.visualinsight.net/new-mural-on-women-innovators-art-meets-research-to-tackle-the-biggest-conundrum-of-our-time/
http://www.visualinsight.net/new-mural-on-women-innovators-art-meets-research-to-tackle-the-biggest-conundrum-of-our-time/#commentsTue, 26 May 2015 06:03:27 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1320Our team is thrilled to launch our Women Inventors and Innovators mural, a story-rich big picture visual that captures the feeling of eras in history – as women changed the game, despite the obstacles. The mural takes a fresh look at the historical context as well as the amazing individual women and their disciplines. It . . . → Read More: New Mural on Women Innovators: Art meets Research to Tackle the Biggest Conundrum of our Time]]>Our team is thrilled to launch our Women Inventors and Innovators mural, a story-rich big picture visual that captures the feeling of eras in history – as women changed the game, despite the obstacles. The mural takes a fresh look at the historical context as well as the amazing individual women and their disciplines. It is an aligning art piece that will help us have new conversations about women for the future. It is the foundation for a radical research project we hope will help catapult women into the positions where we need them (us!).

Before sharing more about the mural and the research, I want to honor the influence of Dr. Douglas Engelbart -and his radical philosophy – on this project. Bear with me on this tangent because Dr. Engelbart’s ideas helped us understand how major transformation occurs. Transformation is one of our goals with this mural.

Dr. Engelbart was the father of Collective IQ who patented the computer mouse as part of the famed ’68 Demo, the prototype of the personal computer. We worked on a book with him over a period of five years, from 2003-2008 and stayed in close touch until his death in 2013. We miss him and want to dedicate this new mural to him. Many life-changing insights emerged from our dialogues with Doug, but the one closest to the heart is that we should dream big and devote ourselves to challenges that may seem impossible. It’s a hero’s journey, whether or not the problem gets solved, and unexpected discoveries may emerge. The goal of Engelbart’s group at the Augmentation Research Center was to raise humanity’s collective IQ to enable us to solve urgent and complex problems. On the way to this lofty and impossible goal, his group innovated the greatest technology discoveries of our time. See our timeline mural featuring Doug’s discoveries in the context of history and his philosophy, the CoEvolution of Human and Tool Systems.

Dr. Engelbart inspired us to dream. Now we are gathering many people in Engelbart’s community to help with a huge and perplexing puzzle we have today: What is standing in the way of women being represented in at least 50 percent of influential positions on the planet? (in science, government, engineering, leadership, politics, business, technology, organizations, etc). This huge and complex question thankfully is receiving an enormous amount of attention. However, the numbers are not changing much–women are underrepresented in nearly every influential sector of society.

Conventional wisdom is not working, and we need new approaches. Many projects to enable diversity are under way; ours is a bit unusual. We start with a landscape and stories – we created this mural as a conversation-sparker. We hope that when people look at this mural, they will see themselves, their mothers, and their grandmothers and perhaps begin to trace the feelings and attitudes that enabled or thwarted women’s contributions. We hope they will begin to uncover the more subtle conditions that may have an influence of women’s full participation in every sector on the planet.

From Dr. Engelbart we learned that the approach to research must be emergent in the context of an overarching goal. We learned about the subtle interrelationship between the evolution of technology and culture. We learned that research and communication tools must be developed in the process of research and communication–they cannot be pre-ordained. Engelbart called this the CoDIAK process: The Concurrent Development, Integration and Application of Knowledge. Thus, we are convening conversations using current technologies that we hope to adapt especially for the type of conversation we will be having: What are the behaviors and attitudes and conditions that empower (or disempower) women? What types of information or communication can support changes? How can women offer one another real-time support, information and stories to help one another through difficult situations? How can we have conversations about topics that may feel awkward? What would happen if women had immediate forums to discover they are not alone in experiencing subtle forces that keep them from moving into positions where they can have impact? With the communication tools we have available, we should be able to go deeper in our conversations and get to the bottom of the problem.

So it’s a very different challenge, a different conversation, and we want to go about it in a different way. We want to inspire your imagination! Our mural emerged from the Imaginal with shapes and pictures that evoke something more than the words. We think that an artistic view helps us with a different perspective. We want to know what you imagine, feel and think when you look at it.

Art is impressionistic and our mural is not a comprehensive final report, but rather a conversation piece. It is decidedly U.S. Centric and creates a gestalt of the different eras in U.S. history. We plan to go global with the mural and create multiple versions to reflect conditions for women around the globe, and will continually be changing it. You’ll see features in the landscape that range from whimsical to disturbing. The green fields of the Agricultural Age, the guns of the World War II era, the “little boxes” of suburbia in the 1950’s. I created this mural originally on old-fashioned paper with pastels, and then Ellen Lovelidge brought it to life with her digital art for the Web, and she worked with Sequoia Echeverry under the tutelage of David Price of DebateGraph to link the names to a robust database that ultimately will enable us to track nuances of the stories.

Besides the artistic orientation, there are other subtle features of the mural that we hope will shift perspective. First of all, the “key” at the left shows our categories. You’ll see we have combined cultural innovations with technological and scientific innovations. Breakthroughs that help society – promoting peace, human rights, or safety – often are placed in the “soft” category, but we think they are just as hard as technological discoveries and deserve equal play. We are also changing the conversation by combining fields and disciplines into categories that focus on outcome. Customarily, we would divide inventions into categories including science, technology, engineering, math…and expanding to include sociology, business, psychology, etc. However, we’ve been looking at research that indicates women often are more motivated by making a contribution and teamwork than they are by invention or making a name for themselves. Hence, we chose categories that focus on outcome such as Augmenting Human Potential (which includes psychological as well as computer breakthroughs) and Promoting Peace. As you read through the key, are there other categories you would add?

Right now, our greatest hope is that people will relax into the mural and take a journey through time. We hope you will have conversations about it, and let us know what you learn. We hope you may join us in our belief that we can figure this out! There is no logical reason why women are not fully represented at every table in ever place of impact on Earth! So there must be an illogical reason. Let’s figure it out together.

]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/new-mural-on-women-innovators-art-meets-research-to-tackle-the-biggest-conundrum-of-our-time/feed/0Visual Toolkit Supporting Organizations in the World of Creativityhttp://www.visualinsight.net/visual-toolkit-supporting-organizations-in-the-world-of-creativity/
http://www.visualinsight.net/visual-toolkit-supporting-organizations-in-the-world-of-creativity/#commentsThu, 23 Oct 2014 18:04:12 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1229Welcome to our visual toolkit supporting organizations go through the looking glass into the transparent world of breakthrough creativity and roles-based collaboration. Here is a snapshot, and please scroll down the earlier post to see our mural from the 2014 Future of Talent retreat, showing the trends that inform our . . . → Read More: Visual Toolkit Supporting Organizations in the World of Creativity]]>Welcome to our visual toolkit supporting organizations go through the looking glass into the transparent world of breakthrough creativity and roles-based collaboration. Here is a snapshot, and please scroll down the earlier post to see our mural from the 2014 Future of Talent retreat, showing the trends that inform our tools.
]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/visual-toolkit-supporting-organizations-in-the-world-of-creativity/feed/0Through the Looking Glass into the World of Creativityhttp://www.visualinsight.net/through-the-looking-glass-into-the-world-of-creativity/
http://www.visualinsight.net/through-the-looking-glass-into-the-world-of-creativity/#commentsFri, 10 Oct 2014 16:50:26 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1219 . . . → Read More: Through the Looking Glass into the World of Creativity]]>

Eileen and Sequoia created this mural to present at the 10th annual Future of Talent retreat in Marin County, CA based on Kevin Wheeler and Eileen’s forecasts of trends that will influence the workplace over the next 3-5 years. We are continuing our research over the next few months and expect significant insights and pragmatic solutions to be released in early 2015. In brief, the trends are:

1. World of Creativity – In the future, leaders will facilitate individuals to develop their own creative potential, while nurturing a co-creative environment where they understand their roles and how to synchronize their gifts. In a world of rapid change and complexity, no one has the answers and success will come from innovation (goal-oriented creativity). We are exploring the specific behaviors and organizational principles that will enable results.

2. Through the Looking Glass – Borrowed from Lewis Carroll whose “Alice in Wonderland” recounted entry into a world where reality is turned upside down, “Through the Looking Glass” is a way to think about how we are challenged to live in the new world of creativity. How would you work differently in a world where people are more important than products? Where health is more important than workaholism? Where emotions and intuition are honored at least as much as left-brain thinking?

4. Designing with Data – Continuous capture and organization of data is essential for decision-making. The challenge is how to curate and apply. An emerging skillset is to marry left and right brain thinking so that data supports wise and innovative decision-making. Needed: objective, robust, well organized data PLUS imagination, intuition and pattern-finding to apply it.

5. Beyond Words – We are well into the visual age. What’s new is the way we are bringing together cognitive science and ancient knowledge about “the shape of thought” to connect with hearts and feelings as well as minds. This trend accompanies “designing with data” as we are challenged to create images that compress massive amounts of information enabling us to see and act on patterns that emerge visually. Images are central in the world of creativity because they can capture shared concepts before they have crystalized into words.

6. Tribes and Teams – The old days are long gone when people would expect to have a single job or even a single profession for their working life. We move in and out of workplaces and careers. Teams are in the moment: The group you are working with now to innovate, create collective action, and achieve goals. Tribes are long-term communities of like-minded people, fellow professionals in your field, mentors and mentees, nearby friends and neighbors who trade ideas even as they are employed or contracted by different organizations. Tribes enable ongoing mutual support.

7. Flat is the new Black – The idea of the flat organization has been around for decades. Yet most workplaces still operate with hierarchy that limits transparency and an individual’s capability to fully contribute to the whole. The gap between knowing and doing is closing as a result of a more nuanced understanding about how collaboration actually works. It’s not a free-for-all, but a new kind of architecture that defines roles, relationships, information flows and effective collective decision-making.

]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/through-the-looking-glass-into-the-world-of-creativity/feed/0Climate Change through Visual Muralshttp://www.visualinsight.net/climate-change-through-visual-murals/
http://www.visualinsight.net/climate-change-through-visual-murals/#commentsThu, 02 Oct 2014 18:12:10 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1208Experts and state leaders gathered at U.C. Davis to evaluate the impact of global climate change on California agriculture. Eileen Clegg depicted the conversations and ideas that emerged at the meeting back in May. Among the speakers was California Gov. Jerry Brown, Jr. The two murals are now posted at the Giannini Foundation offices. . . . → Read More: Climate Change through Visual Murals]]>Experts and state leaders gathered at U.C. Davis to evaluate the impact of global climate change on California agriculture. Eileen Clegg depicted the conversations and ideas that emerged at the meeting back in May. Among the speakers was California Gov. Jerry Brown, Jr. The two murals are now posted at the Giannini Foundation offices. Can you see the elephant in the room?

]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/climate-change-through-visual-murals/feed/0Powering Group Imagination with New Visual Toolshttp://www.visualinsight.net/newtools/
http://www.visualinsight.net/newtools/#commentsTue, 23 Sep 2014 17:04:31 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1200Yes! Visuals ignite creative action. After two years in an MA program studying symbols, imagination and the unconscious, I’ve discovered some new keys to unlocking the power of group imagination. And our Visual Insight Team is transforming this knowledge into new visual tools to help individuals and organizations communicate complex messages both internally among . . . → Read More: Powering Group Imagination with New Visual Tools]]>Yes! Visuals ignite creative action. After two years in an MA program studying symbols, imagination and the unconscious, I’ve discovered some new keys to unlocking the power of group imagination. And our Visual Insight Team is transforming this knowledge into new visual tools to help individuals and organizations communicate complex messages both internally among stakeholders and with their public audience.

Please enjoy the images below and for more details go to our Services page. Thanks to all of our Visual Insight friends for your support on our journey.

Trust-building for Teams: Deep practical connections enabling action-oriented understanding1/2 day session virtually or liveTrust in effective teams usually develops over time as you get to know each others’ strengths, weaknesses and quirks. But with rapid-forming and ever-changing teams today, we need to quicken the process. Visual Insight has developed a breakthrough team-building experience that deeply connects people to work successfully toward shared goals and aspirations in one day, virtually or in the room together.

Springboard Murals: Send us your dense reports or lengthy decks and we will turn the data into a lively, engaging one-page graphic3 day turnaroundMost organizations have key messages that take the form of reports or slide decks. But in our increasingly visual and time-stressed culture, we cannot count on people to wade through too much information. The solution is a one-page big picture graphic that speaks to hearts as well as minds, showing meaning and patterns as well as data. Send us your materials and we’ll turn them into a one page graphic that can be posted on the web or printed out as a handout or poster.

Leader Training in Symbolic Thinking and Visual Communication: Business critical concepts in use of imagery1 day training
Leaders today need to think symbolically and speak the international language of metaphor. This enables them to shape their strategy and culture. Most people have these capabilities innately, but need to rediscover and apply them to be effective leaders.

Visual Insight has also started a publishing company, Visual Insight Press, focused on harvesting wisdom of excellent organizational practitioners, delivering their gems of insight in pithy language and graphics. We welcome your ideas about potential topics and authors. Traditional royalty structure for softcover and e-books. We are excited about our first book, The HOW of leadership by Rob Reindl.

We’re in a time when words and information are flying by us at warp speed, making it nearly impossible to see the big picture at all times. Instead of taking verbal meeting notes or providing a transcript of a session, we take live visual notes during an event and immediately following, have a . . . → Read More: #rwjf1stFri Live Digital Mural]]>

We’re in a time when words and information are flying by us at warp speed, making it nearly impossible to see the big picture at all times. Instead of taking verbal meeting notes or providing a transcript of a session, we take live visual notes during an event and immediately following, have a mural of the information to share with others to help fully comprehend the big picture.

For example: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation holds First Fridays webinars through Google Hangouts to discuss pressing social issues facing our world. Through these webinars, they are developing a community working to change what we’ve come to consider the norm. On September 5, a #rwjf1stFri webinar was held to discuss Active Kids, Healthier Food as the school year is beginning and childhood obesity is an important issue to combat. Speakers from nonprofits, Nike and a school in Philadelphia answered questions pertaining to this topic and questions from the audience followed.

This mural was created live during the meeting, a wonderful technology that more and more businesses and organizations are using to help get the message across in the most memorable way possible. Any meeting or webinar can be captured live, helping your audience make the most of the message they’ve received and enabling them to easily share with others, spreading the word in a form that is both easy to understand and remember.

]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/rwjf1stfri-live-digital-mural/feed/0Visual Insight’s takeaway from Churchill Club talk by Neil Jacobstein of Singularity Universityhttp://www.visualinsight.net/visual-insights-takeaway-from-churchill-club-talk-by-neil-jacobstein-of-singularity-university/
http://www.visualinsight.net/visual-insights-takeaway-from-churchill-club-talk-by-neil-jacobstein-of-singularity-university/#commentsThu, 03 Jul 2014 17:05:28 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1152 ]]>
]]>http://www.visualinsight.net/visual-insights-takeaway-from-churchill-club-talk-by-neil-jacobstein-of-singularity-university/feed/0Youth Summit at Nobel Peace Prize Ceremonieshttp://www.visualinsight.net/youth-summit-at-nobel-peace-prize-ceremonies/
http://www.visualinsight.net/youth-summit-at-nobel-peace-prize-ceremonies/#commentsSat, 04 Jan 2014 05:33:47 +0000http://www.visualinsight.net/?p=1014 While the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honored people contributing to peace on today’s Earth, a group of young people joined in with their vision for peace in the future world. Twenty-five students and social entrepreneurs chosen for the Telenor Youth Summit imagined innovative ways to bring safety, health, community and lifelong . . . → Read More: Youth Summit at Nobel Peace Prize Ceremonies]]>While the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honored people contributing to peace on today’s Earth, a group of young people joined in with their vision for peace in the future world. Twenty-five students and social entrepreneurs chosen for the Telenor Youth Summit imagined innovative ways to bring safety, health, community and lifelong learning to diverse geographies. Bringing perspectives from 13 different countries, they came up with practical solutions to overwhelming challenges, including female empowerment, education, health & quality of life, digital responsibility, democracy and equality. They presented their cross-cultural solutions to global leaders of government, business and education at a reception before the Nobel Peace Prize Concert.

I had the honor of visually supporting and accompanying these future leaders as they engaged in a World Café and other think tank exercises to develop their vision with specific projects, then presented them at the Nobel Peace Prize event to world leaders who could help bring their ideas to fruition. We were all fortunate to have as facilitator Jan Taug, CMO in Telenor Business Internet services, whose Ph.D. work helped develop the innovative World Cafe methodology. Graphic recording is a key part of World Cafe process. The young people rotated tables and created visual notes to help them capture emergent ideas in a co-creative process, while I created murals and borrowed more than a few of their visual metaphors. Words and images together captured the smart, savvy and heartfelt ideas generated by these citizens of Pakistan, Sweden, Norway, Bangladesh, Thailand, India, Denmark, Russia, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Hungary, Malaysia and Serbia.

Invited to the Oslo City Hall for the Nobel Prize ceremony, then hosted for luncheon across the street at the Nobel Peace Prize Center (photo) these global voices for the millennial generation were later center stage at a reception concert, where they shared their vision for the future before enjoying performances by Mary J. Blige, James Blunt, Morrissey, Timbuktu, Jake Bugg with Claire Danes and Aaron Eckhart as hosts–all accompanied by the Norwegian Radio Orchestra. I was expecting Mozart and Beethoven, but this was a rock concert extraordinaire.

Each venue gave the Youth Summit participants a platform to be heard, to know that their ideas mattered, and to find support for their real-world-future-oriented solutions for humanity and the planet.

Chosen through a competition hosted by Telenor, Norway’s 150-year-old telecommunications company, all of the young leaders had developed organizations or apps designed to empower social and economic change. One, for example, was an app enabling women to instantly call 30 people for help if they were in danger. Another was an incentive system for recycling in a country lagging behind in environmental laws. Check out this video where the participants articulate their philosophies, global concerns and particular worries about their countries. They also demonstrated joy of community, bonding quickly, beginning with a frolick in Oslo’s first snow of the season, some experiencing snow for the first time.

I enjoyed each and every one of them so much, and felt great hope for the future of our planet being in their presence. In the mural below, I captured their vision: “A vision of the Future as a Society that Has a Sense of Global Community” (the sun). The enabler of this vision will be “Education and Mindset Driving Democracy” (the world tree). And the gap between possibilities and reality comes about through seeds planted in government and policies (the globe).

Helping them hone their vision was Ola Jo Tandre, Director of Business Sustainability for Telenor. Meanwhile, head of Telenor’s cultural programme Randi Enebakk-Due and project manager Nina Koren choreographed their experience to maximize innovation, comfort and connection among the group. The hosts seemed deeply attuned to the subtle aspects of community-building, while nudging these young social entrepreneurs to stretch their thinking and their creativity.

It seemed fitting that the first Telenor Youth Summit coincided with a rare Nobel Prize given to an organization rather than an individual.The 2013 Nobel Prize went to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, an international organization behind the phrase we hear so often in the news, “Chemical weapons inspectors went into….” One of the themes of the youths’ discussions was that problems cannot be solved by individuals but only through collaboration between people, families, communities and nations.

In the mural below, I sought to capture the essence of their belief in the potential for technology to create peace-keeping connectivity, including apps for crowdfunding, helping the environment, and providing safety (in the form of support and transparency) for women, supporting healthful lifestyles with apps and information, and enhancing learning with apps for different learning styles and geographies. But, as one of the participants said in the video, “technology is a double edged sword,” threatening credibility of information and individuals’ privacy (the cliff).

From this, a central theme emerged: To enable the transparency and connectivity that can enable learning for all, restore safety for women, support civil governments, empower communities, incubate innovative ideas, promote collaboration and bring health to the daily lives of people, we first need. Digital Responsibility. (Mural below). In order to convince a rural farmer to use mobile technology support healthful habits and to gain practical knowledge toward a better life, that farmer needs to know privacy is protected and information can be trusted. The youths called upon global business, government, and nonprofit organizations to work together to develop protocols and policies that will rebuild trust in the Internet. This was a call to action for their hosts at Telenor, to take a leadership role in a global effort to promote integrity in the digital world.

We will continue to follow their work individually and as a community of future leaders, and I will never forget this amazing time when the seeds for a better future were firmly planted on fertile soil in an atmosphere of peace and joy.

Visual Insight’s Eileen Clegg recently participated in Silicon Valley-based web TV show ‘Just Picture It’ and created this mural for the show. The episode is a fascinating look at visual communication and its importance as more and more information comes into our daily lives. Watch the entire episode below.

Visual Insight’s Eileen Clegg recently participated in Silicon Valley-based web TV show ‘Just Picture It’ and created this mural for the show. The episode is a fascinating look at visual communication and its importance as more and more information comes into our daily lives. Watch the entire episode below.

We at Visual Insight have been researching how imagery affects imagination in the subtlest yet most profound ways. Even though words are not fit to describe the “alternative language” of visuals, we enjoy the challenge. We also enjoy an engaging conversation, and we’re eager to hear what the folks in our . . . → Read More: Visual Insight Tweet Chat: “Language of Imagination”]]>

We at Visual Insight have been researching how imagery affects imagination in the subtlest yet most profound ways. Even though words are not fit to describe the “alternative language” of visuals, we enjoy the challenge. We also enjoy an engaging conversation, and we’re eager to hear what the folks in our network have to say on this topic. So, we have decided to convene a tweet chat, and we would be honored if you joined us on Tuesday, August 20th, from 10-11am (Pacific Standard Time) to discuss the “Language of Imagination.”

What is a Tweet Chat? A Tweet Chat, or Twitter Chat, brings a group of interested people together at a set time using Twitter as their communication platform. Using the hashtag #VIchat, @VisualInsight will pose a series of questions during a one-hour timeframe, which will be answered by participants also using the hashtag #VIchat. Questions will be labeled Q1, Q2, Q3, etc. and corresponding answers will be A1, A2, A3, etc.

The series of tweets forming a conversation can be followed on http://twubs.com/VIchat or when clicking on #VIchat through Twitter’s site. Users will retweet or respond to others’ answers using the #VIchat hashtag. We look forward to a compelling dialogue among peers. We’ll learn a lot from each other and meet others with similar interests from all over the world. For more background on Tweet Chats please visit this link.

Tweet Chat Topic Questions

How do you feel group dynamics change when ideas are turned into pictures?

Visual communicators illustrate the ideas of groups. What if group members were to draw the ideas themselves?

Is it part of a visual communicator’s job to help those of us who don’t self-identify as “artists” express ourselves visually?

Is it becoming more or less natural for us to express ourselves with visuals in a collaborative setting?

Our Vision

I have been involved in an M.A. program in Depth Psychology specifically to understand what we are beginning to call the “imaginal” function of the human mind, and how that creative force works collectively. I know leaders among leaders who encourage the use of visuals for people to share their stories with one another in order to create stronger teams. I am thus certain that this type of visual communication is future-oriented communication, and I am curious about how diffuse it is as a practice.

In my experience as a graphic recorder, it is my belief that visuals connect people on a deeper psychic level, enabling them to imagine possibilities together in a way that cannot happen with words alone. Visual communication is somewhere between reality and dreams. When the images come from the heart, they can help shape our thinking, our feeling, and our reality. In groups, this can be a powerful mover of energy.

Graphic recorders—or as we call ourselves, “visual journalists,” because we are scribes as well as artists—are often brought into meetings as a novel approach to capturing content. But our function is broader than that. We are creating the Big Picture—a story that has coherence not only on a logical level, but also on an emotional and imaginal plane.